History VideoGame / Transistor

** The Bracket Towers Maintenance Section has the code 0451, which is famously used as the initial door code in ''VideoGame/SystemShock''.

** The Bracket Towers Maintenance Section has the code 0451, which is famously used as the initial door code in ''VideoGame/SystemShock'', and many games referencing this since. (Which is itself a reference to ''Literature/{{Fahrenheit451}}''.)

** Using Help() as a passive command gives you a 25% chance of becoming a Superuser whenever you use Turn(), giving you access to the unique Kill() command that has the highest base damage in the game, but it can't be enhanced with support commands and using it once takes up your entire Turn(), meaning you can't perform any combos with it either. Borders on AnnoyingVideoGameHelper (or [[JustForPun Annoying Video Game Help()er?]]) if you were lining up for a piercing attack like Breach(); you're out of luck since you can only use Kill() this turn and it explodes on first impact.

* UnintentionallyUnwinnable: The Permanence limiter makes functions overload whenever you uninstall them. An insane player might try to use this to overload all of their functions, but functions start uninstalling normally again when you're down to your last four. There are only three functions in the game that are completely incapable of dealing damage in their base form... but with the [[NewGamePlus Recursion]] copies of those functions it is possible to make sure that your last four functions can't deal damage. Since the game uses a profile system for saves, leaving this state requires restoring a manual backup.

* MutuallyExclusivePowerups: Once you enter NewGamePlus and start getting duplicate functions, you cannot use both copies of a function as an upgrade for another active function or as passives for yourself. You can, however, use a copy of a function to upgrade itself.

* {{Doppelganger}}: Each time you attack Younglady, it will FlashStep out of your way and create a 'shadow' in its place to prevent you from [[SpamAttack tearing it apart too easily]]. This also renders your Turn() only good for one or two backstabs at best, unless she's stunned.

* MinimalistCast: Not quite to ''Videogame/{{Bastion}}'s'' extent, but there are seven characters in the entire game (not counting the couple of people that are processed into the Transistor at the start of the game), and one of them is a news reporter who never interacts with the other characters, [[spoiler: one of them is transformed into a Process by the time you meet up with her, and another kills himself before the player can meet or even speak with him.]]

** Red has toys of [[VideoGame/{{Bastion}} a Windbag and a Cael Hammer]] in her apartment.

** If you fumble the puzzle that requires two break points to be activated simultaneously enough times. Hitting the same Break Point twice, the game outright tells you to use Turn(), when the Transistor says "Wait a sec". Hitting it a third time, even if it's to do it right, will cause the game to give up and open the break points for you, although the Transistor will be embarrassed by this (and you should be too).

** If you fumble the puzzle that requires two break points to be activated simultaneously enough times, the game outright tells you to use Turn(). Continuing to fumble it ''after that'' will cause the game to give up and open the break points for you, although the Transistor will be embarrassed by this (and you should be too).

* ArcNumber: Abusively uses many numbers related to computing, architecture, and general online fora mechanics. Sixteen slots of available input and functions [[spoiler:which loops to 32 functions after a certain level]].

* ArcNumber: Abusively uses many numbers related to computing, architecture, and general online fora mechanics. Sixteen slots of available input and functions [[spoiler:which loops to 32 functions after a certain level]]. Two achievements (1024, 2048) point to [[UsefulNotes/PowersOfTwoMinusOne another trope]].

* YouAreWorthHell: In the ending, [[spoiler:Red and her friend]] got absorbed by the Transistor, and now live happily in the Country.

* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: [[spoiler:Sybil.]] She tries to pull a MurderTheHypotenuse by having the Camerata target Red without telling them that her friend would be there with her, expecting him to die protecting her. Her plan works, but she didn't count on the man hijacking the Transistor and using it to teleport Red to safety, kickstarting the game's plot.

* ArtDeco: The art direction takes inspiration from {{Cyberpunk}}, Art Deco, and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_Klimt Gustav Klimt.]]

* KillEmAll: [[spoiler:By the end of the game, Cloudbank is completely processed, with no confirmed survivors, and Red kills herself with the Transistor. The game still manages to pull a happy ending out of it, as she is now within the Transistor and lives with her lover in the Country.]]

* HardModeMook: The game only permits you to fight first-tier enemies on the first go-round, and as a result, you only get first-tier chips for the duration of the run. On a NewGamePlus, though, the enemies are upgraded to second tier, moving faster and hitting harder and yielding stronger chips. Some even have additional effects to their attacks. Go on yet another new game plus run after that, and the enemies will reach their third and strongest tier.

** This is really taken UpToEleven if you believe that [[spoiler:the Transistor takes the souls and sends them somewhere called the Country to live ever after]].